UK Politics Mega-thread - Page 397

On October 31 2017 08:49 Liquid`Drone wrote:
yeah like, I'm not saying it's 'perfectly appropriate behavior'. But there's a mountain of difference between groping someone and putting your hand on their knee.

On October 31 2017 20:43 Liquid`Drone wrote:
get away with what? the thrill of touching someone's knee? To me it sounds like he was trying to hit on her, she rejected him, he accepted it. She was probably friendly towards him, whoever the guy is isn't too much of a casanova, interprets general friendliness as flirtatiousness, tries to move the conversation one step forward, she says no.

Like, say you've been working somewhere for a couple months. There's a girl there you've been kinda flirtatious towards. Then everybody goes out for drinks at a pub-club whatever, you're sitting next to the girl, you're talking, smiling, laughing, having a good time. You haven't explicitly talked about having feelings for each other or whatever, that's not how you start the conversation, but you're curious whether there's something there, so you kinda slide your hand behind her back. Not to grope, but to see how she responds to the idea of your relationship being 'physical'. This is totally fine behavior. If she smiles towards you at this point, there's something there. If she becomes uncomfortable you move your hand. Now, seeing as this type of conversation is non-verbal and how it depends on experience in interpreting signals and how someone might be a little drunk and how someone wants to interpret signals favorably even if the signal is neutral or even polite-negative, this kind of situation sometimes makes someone be a little more touchy-feely than the other person wants or is comfortable with.

I'm not saying this is how stuff transpired, but my impression is that touching someone's knee isn't something a sexual predator or molester does. It's what someone who wants to move the relationship to the next level does. Maybe it's gonna be less of an issue in the future because everybody meets through tinder and then you've already gotten an indication that touching the knee is probably fine, but pretty much every sexual relationship I've had has started with this type of exploratory behavior. And a couple times I've been wrong. As long as you don't immediately grope and you respect the no, you're fine.

On October 31 2017 22:11 Artisreal wrote:

Sexual harassment is, in my opinion, up to the person being harassed.
Touching your knee, feeling out your reaction. This is also something someone who wants to get in your pants does.You can laugh it off like she did, which is fair, but calling the same act harassment is fair as well. It can be highly contextual, as you poited out, which makes it rather difficult to "draw the line. Its not up to the general public to decide how the "victim" felt or where to draw the line.
Drawing a gernalizing statement, which many like to do in this discussion to get a framework whats allowed and what not imo doesn't work, exactly because people experience situations differently and act according to their character. This is to be taken into account by whoever wants to touch someone.

If you feel that this is too much, go for it anway but don't complain about the bitch being overly sensitive if it backfires.

On October 31 2017 21:02 Kickboxer wrote:
You're not going to get very far in the dating game if you're not willing to put your hand on a woman's knee without "asking for permission". Stopping at the first sign of resistance - or not - is what constitutes harassment if we're talking non-private parts. Or that's at least what I think.

On October 31 2017 22:19 farvacola wrote:

That's far too broad a brush; randomly touching a woman's leg at a workplace or in public can easily figure as sexual harassment with only one occurrence. My guess is that there's a discrepancy at work here in terms of people who don't often get randomly touched by strangers and those who do.

On October 31 2017 22:19 farvacola wrote:

That's far too broad a brush; randomly touching a woman's leg at a workplace or in public can easily figure as sexual harassment with only one occurrence. My guess is that there's a discrepancy at work here in terms of people who don't often get randomly touched by strangers and those who do.

On November 01 2017 05:09 sc-darkness wrote:
Jesus Christ. Since when is it inappropriate to touch a girl on her knee? If she rejects you, then you should surely stop. Other than that, I don't see a problem. Grow a pair. If you ask for a permission to touch her knee for the first time, that will probably waste the nice surprise if she is into you.

On November 01 2017 05:17 Artisreal wrote:

One word. Context.

A Labour activist has claimed she was raped at a party event and then advised by a senior official not to report the attack because it could “damage” her career.

Bex Bailey, 25, has alleged she was attacked by a senior party figure, who was not an MP, at an event in 2011 when she was 19-years-old.

She said she approached someone at the Labour Party headquarters to ask about reporting the attack but was discouraged from going to the police.

On November 01 2017 07:51 Liquid`Drone wrote:
And I must say that while I persistently argue that not every sexually inappropriate behavior is assault and that I think we must be careful with demonizing people for slightly overstepping what frequently is a gray area, I also think it's awesome that so many women feel empowered enough to go public with stories of actual rape and actual sexual assault. Really positive development.

On November 01 2017 08:09 Reaps wrote:



Yes, and at the same time pretty horrifying since now we know how often this kind of stuff actually happens.